Utilization of recycled and secondary materials in concrete production - LCA

Abstract

The paper describes an assessment of concrete in terms of environmental impacts in relation to the utilization of recycled materials. The article includes a short summary of the literature search on evaluation methods for environmental impacts and on recycled and secondary materials. The environmental impacts of several concrete mixtures were calculated. The reference concrete mixture containing only cement as a binder and only natural aggregate was compared with other mixtures containing recycled and secondary materials as a binder or aggregates. Some of these concrete mixtures were then compared within the whole structure. Variant design of a simple structure was performed, whereas the variants differed in the concrete mixture. These variants were then evaluated in terms of environmental impacts.

Keywords

• concrete
• environmental impacts
• life cycle assessment
• recycled and secondary materials
• variant design